Giovani dos Santos

"I am someone who believes that if you close a chapter at one place then you cannot go back.” - Giovani Dos Santos

Giovani Dos Santos, the son of Brazilian footballer Zizinho, was a member of the Mexican National U-17 team that won the 2005 World Cup. He was also awarded the Silver Ball for the tournament. In league play, in the final game of his rookie season in La Liga, Giovani Dos Santos potted a hat trick for Barcelona.

MAGNETISM

When you’re a 19-year-old soccer phenom from a soccer-doting country, you’re bound to have a few honeys envy your status. He’s a rising star, a hot commodity and he’s rich. However Giovani Dos Santos looks young, really young, which cuts down his demographic. He’s in the “cute” category and the girls who like a seasoned, mature man will look elsewhere. He’s for the teenie-boppers who idolize an athlete with a hot bod or a Ronaldinho look-alike.

SUCCESS

While Giovani Dos Santos is a promising young prospect on the rise, he hasn’t tasted much success to this point. His main accomplishments have come from the 2005 U-17 World Cup, where he was his team’s most valuable player and assisted with half of the goals. He was awarded the Adidas Silver Ball, which recognizes the second-best player in the tournament.

Although he broke through with Barcelona’s senior club at a relatively young age, he hasn’t seen consistent playing time. Barcelona had a moderately successful season this year, finishing third in La Liga, which was Giovani Dos Santos’ only year with the club.

Giovani dos Santos Biography

Giovani Alex dos Santos Ramirez was born on May 11, 1989, in Monterrey, the capital city of the northeastern Mexican state Nuevo Leon.

Born to renowned Brazilian footballer Gerardo Dos Santos, better known as Zizinho, the sport of soccer was in the family bloodlines. Giovani Dos Santos has two brothers and two half brothers. His two blood brothers, Eder and Jonathan, also play professional soccer.

After attending a soccer school where his father founded and coached, Giovani Dos Santos made a name for himself in the Dallas Cup, an American tournament for U-12 players. Based on his performance there, he earned a tryout with to a top Mexican team, Club Monterrey. It didn’t take him long to rise in that organization.

His mother was Mexican and his father was Brazilian, and even though he had options, he chose to represent Mexico internationally since that was the country in which he was born.

giovani dos santos plays the u-17 & u-20 world cups

It didn’t take long for Giovani dos Santos to earn some attention in Europe. It was always his dream to play in the European leagues, which came to fruition when an FC Barcelona scout started to take notice of him while Club Monterrey was playing a European tournament.

It wasn’t long after that Giovani dos Santos was in Barcelona’s program, playing for the youth teams.

While playing his way through the youth levels, Giovani dos Santos managed to play for Mexico’s national team at the 2005 FIFA U-17 World Cup.

Giovani dos Santos was outstanding in the tournament, assisting on half of his teams goals. He was truly the most valuable player on his team and was one of the main reasons his team won the title. For his efforts, he was award the Adidas Silver Ball, given to the second-best player in the tournament. If Giovani dos Santos was a good looking youngster beforehand, this World Cup tournament was his international coming out party as a burgeoning young prospect.

Giovani dos Santos would represent his country once again just two years later in the FIFA U-20 World Cup. Again, he was the team’s top player but after an impressive showing in the group phase, Mexico fell short in a hard-fought battle against eventual winners Argentina.

Although his team didn’t finish as strong, he was still awarded the Adidas Bronze Ball, handed out to the third-best player in the tournament.

giovani dos santos makes barcelona’s senior team

Given his similar looks and style of play to Ronaldinho, Giovani dos Santos is often compared to his fellow Barcelona star. Understandably, there had been a lot of hype surrounding him since he entered the team’s youth program. He made his first impression with the senior squad in an exhibition match in Denmark during their pre-season tour. In his debut, he potted his first goal against AGF Aarhus.

As the 2007-08 season began, again Giovani dos Santos joined the senior team for their pre-season tour. This time, he would stick with the big team and start to earn regular season minutes. He made his debut on September 2, 2007, when his number was called upon to replace Thierry Henry in the 62nd minute. Just over two weeks later, on September 19, Giovani dos Santos would make his Champions League debut when he was subbed in for Xavi in the 79th minute.

Giovani dos Santos saved his best for last, though, as he left a dazzling impression in the club’s final game of the season. He found the back of the net three times against Real Murcia and helped his team to a 5-3 victory.

giovani dos santos plays in barcelona; transfer to tottenham

Giovani dos Santos is definitely a talented young player, but unfortunately his career at Barcelona took a backseat to other young superstars like Lionel Messi and Bojan Krkic.

Minutes grew scarce and as the other players around him developed into contributors, it became clear that Giovani dos Santos wouldn’t have a starting spot in the coming year.

FC Barcelona had been fielding plenty of interest for his services as AC Milan, Real Madrid, Chelsea, and Manchester United had inquired about his services. In the end, he transferred to Tottenham for roughly eight million Euros because of the opportunity to play under Spanish coach Juande Ramos. Juande Ramos believed he will become a great player, which is why he invested in him. He’s not the only one; Nike set him up with an endorsement deal as well.